Marco to Bo (especially), with references to Gerhard and Platt and Magnus and
Roger,
and to Andrea (we have discussed Language and Rituals a bit on the Italian
Forum)
and MD
(it's a bit long, sorry)
Bo wrote:
>
> Over to MARCO who wrote (to Sam):
> > thanks for your post. I think that emotions are biological as they
> > arise at the biological level. And thought also. IMO it's a frequent
> > mistake here to equalize thought or mind with intellect.
> We disagree about emotions' place in the static hierarchy, but as
> with our disagreement about the Q-idea itself (I see it as a budding
> 5th level, you see it as an intellectual pattern) it might be
> reconciled. At the upper reaches of the biological development,
> emotions may have arisen (out of sensation), but from there
> "started on a purpose of its own". Each level was originally an
> "unruly child" that couldn't be controlled by its parent. In my
> opinion language was the unruly social pattern that became the
> carrier of intellectual value.
Dear Bo, we have discussed infinite times of emotions and language and SOLAQI,
and how to put things in the right level, and I must confess that recently I've
changed a little my ancient positions. And, to a certain extent, I'm maybe a
little closer to your SOLAQI... No, don't worry, I'm not that crazy, and I've
not become a SOLAQIst :-) Actually, I have many doubts about something we used
to agree on. This post refreshes practically all those discussions.....
My first doubt came about language. You know well how many times I've supported
wholeheartedly the concept of language as the social "DNA of intellect"...
[ by the way, Gerhard wrote:
> Marco IMO misplaced the Language on the
> intellectual level, rather than on the social level :-).
well, Gerhard, I don't know exactly which of my posts you are referring to, but
I've always considered language as social. Just, in the past, many (Bo, me and
others) have considered language as the *very refined social pattern* able to
evolve up to create a new -intellectual- level. Anyway, as this message wants
to refresh all that, keep this as the good one.... ]
... but I started with this doubt: considering that language is the
fundamental tool in order to share information, to communicate, that means "to
be as one"... where does the idea of "self" come out? SOLAQI or nor SOLAQI, we
both agree that the S/O
dichotomy is the main intellectual form (even, you claim it is the intellect
itself). How could I get the distinction between me and the world (S/O Logic) by
means of a tool that can just unify me and the others?
As often happens, I've left the doubt in a wait state for some weeks; then last
May, in a sunny Saturday, it's happened that I've gone to the beach with nothing
to read. I was alone (!), and after a long swim in a very cold water (May's
water is just good for Scandinavians here, but I have apparently Scandinavian
origins!) I felt the wish to read something.
There's a small book store near there, and I purchased a copy of Bruce Chatwin's
last novel: The Songlines. I can't quote it, as it's in Italian, but, in few
words, Chatwin tells how the ritual songs among the Australian natives have been
for thousands years a usual vehicle of knowledge. And how those natives use to
go away for their "walkabout", a sort of ritual solitary march, following the
"songlines" of their tribe... a trip on a way sketched in the rhythm of ritual
songs, to rediscover their origins and pursue awareness. More generally, Chatwin
holds that nomadism had a prominent role in human development. Much more than
stancialism.
Immediately, it has recalled me a poem by Giacomo Leopardi, a famous (here, at
least) Italian poet of 200 years ago, "Night song of a wandering Asian shepherd"
(http://www.brindinpress.demon.co.uk/pileocan.htm ) [a bizarre title, indeed,
for a poem, but not more than ZAMM, I'd say] where he imagines a solitary
ancient nomad in the Asian steppe, who looks at the moon and asks himself.
"What do you do, moon, aloft? " and after a long reasoning, comes to another
very deep question: "For what the sky's infinity, for what the deep, non-finite
air? What signifies this solitude immense? And what am I? "
But.... wasn't it the same what Pirsig wrote in his "Cruising Blues" paper? And
wasn't it the same I tried in vane to explain to Roger few months ago, when I
suggested "autonomy" as a possible ingredient for self-awareness? Then Roger
blamed me, and he was right as my idea was all but coherent, at that time. But
now my thought is more clear. I think that the idea of the self (the very first
intellectual pattern, parent of all the S/O thinking, and parent of the
Socrates' "Gnothi Se Auton" and of the Descartes "Cogito" and of the Bill of
Human Rights.... ) came out not from language, but in those societies where the
division of labor has determined that it was "good" for someone to be isolated
for some times in order to perform some social duty. Actually, this is the great
difference between human and animal societies: a complex and dynamic division of
labor....
Now that I've seen that also Platt is onto a similar position, I feel more
convinced of this idea (and I'm glad to finally agree with Platt on a
metaphysical issues, given that politically there's no hope :-) )
Platt:
> According to Pirsig, the intellectual level arose in service of
> the social level. Division of labor proved beneficial to the
> group. Once the idea of divide-to-survive gained credence,
> the intellectual level took off and hasn't stopped since.
> Individualism arose and freedom became not simply a dim
> apprehension, but a recognized high good. The
> nerve-synapse pattern that began as weak response to DQ
> in the distant past had mushroomed under the influence
> of DQ to include more and more of DQ within it's purview.
> Consciousness as we know it today, ever ready to
> respond to DQ's call, came into being.
Actually, as Platt says, the answer is clearly in Lila.
Chapter 30:
".. anthropological studies of contemporary primitive tribes suggest that stone
age people were probably bound by ritual all day long. There's a ritual for
washing, for putting up a house, for hunting, for eating and so on - so much
that the division between "ritual" and "knowledge" becomes indistinct. In
cultures without books ritual seems to be a public library for teaching the
young and preserving common values and information".
" These rituals may be the connecting link between the social and the
intellectual levels of evolution. One can imagine primitive song-rituals and
dance-rituals associated with certain cosmology stories, myths, which generated
the first primitive religions. From these the first intellectual truths could
have been derived".
In the thread about atomic awareness, I was imagining an ancient guardian of the
camp, alone all night. Just like the Asian nomad of Leopardi, the Australian
native in walkabout of Chatwin, the seafarer of Pirsig's Cruising Blues.... I
used that term, autonomous, and Roger went mad :-) OK. Hopefully isolated is
a good term.
And, as Roger teaches, it's a Positive Sum Game. Dividing labor and giving a
component a solitary duty, the Giant gains the possibility of quick decisions,
and becomes more efficient... while the single becomes a Subject, more than
merely a number: being temporary alone, the individual has to choose on the
basis of his own experience, and learns to judge his own old choices. IMO, here
is the reason for the creation of self-awareness.
So, division of labor and the connected rituals have been the social basis for
the intellect creation.
Then, what about language? We all agree that the intellectual symbolic language
is much different from the social non symbolic language of many animals (and
human everyday life, also) . IMO the answer is again in isolation. When we need
to explain something to someone who will have to live isolated for some times,
we have to refer to possible future scenarios; and when the isolated comes back
to explain what's happened, he must use a symbolic language to indicate
something past. And "giving things a name" is VERY intellectual. In few words
what's happened? The *excellent isolated* invents a different form of
communication to share a different kind of knowledge, and uses what was already
available in the lower level (social language), empowering it for the new
requirements. Intellect was born.
So, language is social or intellectual... or even biological? This question is
all but new, in these forums. Generally, many *riots* here are about the right
place of emotions, drugs, language, mind, thought, democracy, freemarket,
communism..... Never ending discussions. I have come to the (temporary)
conclusion that there is not "one" level of existence for things, there's just a
level in which they arise, then they will be used and empowered, if needed, by
all the upper levels. For example, matter arises as inorganic, then it's used by
every level.
If I go back to the biological level, there's one biological behavior that is
IMO the first appearance of social level: sex. A lot of biological beings don't
need sex, but by means of the sexual division, the possibility of genetic
variations indeed increased. A sex-based biologic being is more dynamic. (By
the way, this is a very old -biological- division, that precedes any social and
intellectual division. I'd say that every level has its divisions.... ) In
order to make it possible to make sex, it was necessary to have a common
"communication protocol" to recognize each other as members of the same species,
and of a certain sex. You see, when we speak of a "virus colony", IMO it's hard
to say it's social, as a single virus is able to replicate itself up to the
colony. But when sex arose, beings needed communication. Be it chemical
(pheromones), visible (colors, gesture), phonic (signals), or whatever else, the
first forms of communication were necessary for every proto-social behavior.
Then, when the social organization increased with new roles (not only male and
female, but also young and old, chief and pack, up to governors and voters.... )
the social language arose. That is, society took something that was existing at
the biological level (communication), and empowered it for its purposes. The
same happened, as said, in the social-intellectual transition, when intellect
used the social language and begun to give things a name.
By the way, I find interesting Magnus' interpretation of social level as every
form of cooperation (even protons with electrons). But I would restrain the
"social" attribute to those cooperation's of similar biological individuals,
able to differentiate into roles. So I agree now (I was not onto this position,
once) that bees are social; but IMO a virus colony and, especially, particles
are far from that. I must also recognize that Magnus' position is not weak at
all.
Anyway, that's why, Bo, I say that emotions arise biological. I guess that many
mammals have simple emotions (not merely sensations), and not necessarily in a
social context. My cat is glad to rest at the sunlight *alone*, and the last
thing she wants then is to have social interactions. IMO, her gladness is more
than sensation. And I think I'm not anthropomorphizing: the chemical reactions
inside my body, connected with emotions, are not that different from the other
mammals. So, even if our gladness is indeed more complex, I've no problems to
say that even cats are glad. Then, when the social level arose, it was good to
use emotions, and so emotions were empowered for social convenience (pride, for
example; and IMO also hate), or channeled into a restrained familiar context
(love). And IMO there's nothing strange arguing that the
intellectual/individual level CAN use emotions as means for its purposes. If we
assume that one of the main purposes (or maybe the only) of the 4th level is to
gain the individual freedom from society, well, I give emotion a great ranking.
The same happened also with many other biological skills. Intelligence and
thought, for example. Many animals have a rudimental intelligence, then the
social level empowered it, and finally intellect makes it develop to the role
we all know.
Assigning things to levels is not easy. Probably it's not even very correct. I
had in the past good reasons to state that technology is social and not
intellectual. That art is intellectual, that thought is biological.... and all
the times there have been discussions. We have searched for the *machine codes*
of the various levels, but, I'm not sure that every level needs a set of
information in order to exist. Maybe, this is not a *rule*. it is merely what's
happened in the inorganic-social step. But every level has a special *game*.
Carbon Atom and Life. Sex and Communication. Ritual Division of Labor and
Individual. These special *games* could IMO explain the three great steps. And,
yes, Platt, I agree that this is a story of increasing degrees of consciousness.
And that consciousness is, finally, the ability to access Quality.
I've been really too long, but let me end with a brief consideration about
SOLAQI. Bo, this post brings me a bit closer to your position. If the creation
of the individual out of a social context is the basis of the intellectual
level, it would seem very reasonable to state that the intellectual level is the
S/O division itself. But, still, I don't think so. This division has been very
powerful for the individual purpose to free himself from society, but, really,
it is not the only one possibility. The S/O logic has been a great attempt to
define a self (as subject), but we can well use other means to free our selves
from society, without a strict equality of the self with a SOMish subject. IMO
the artistic activity is about the investigation of the self; it's about the
self-consciousness; it's about accessing Quality on an individual level; needs a
great independence and often isolation from society; and it's all but SOMish.
The mistake of the SOM has been, definitely, to assume the SOMish subject as
self, forgetting that the self exists and comes out from, sort of reflected by,
the ritual activities we carry on in our everyday life. There's no self without
interactions with other selves, with the giant, with biology, and with our
universe. In the end, I think we should restart from the "Gnothi Se Auton".
Well, it's all.
Many thanks for Your attention and Your patience
Ciao,
Marco
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archive - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat Aug 17 2002 - 16:01:25 BST